Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Since members of the British Parliament have complained about receiving several fundraising emails from Donald Trump, politicians in several other foreign countries have revealed that they've also been flooded with email requests for donations from Trump.

Members of parliament in Australia, Iceland, Denmark, and Finland have all received the emails, according to news reports and tweets from the politicians.

Tim Watts, an Australian member of parliament, told TPM's John Marshall on Twitter that he has received several fundraising emails from the Trump campaign, and that he believes all Australian members of parliament have gotten the emails as well.

The Trump campaign has also asked members of parliament in Iceland for campaign contributions, according to Icelandic media. At least three Icelandic members of parliament have received a Trump fundraising email, according to the Iceland Monitor. A couple members of parliament told the Morgublaðið newspaper that they had received emails, according to a report in Iceland Magazine.

"This whole matter is very perplexing. The letter left me speechless," Katrín Jakobsdóttir, the head of Iceland's Left Green Party, reportedly said.

And a member of parliament in Denmark, Ida Auken, revealed on Twitter that she had also received a fundraising email from Trump.

Anders Adlercreutz, a member of parliament in Finland, also said on Twitter that Finnish elected officials have received the fundraising pleas from Trump.

Marshall assumes this is a screw up in buying an email list from someone and not knowing how to eliminate the addresses from which it's illegal to solicit donations. Because this is definitely illegal:

The only plausible answer seems to be that the Trump campaign either dealt with a sloppy or disreputable list broker or was so desperate after its horrible May FEC report was released that it went to a broker and just said they wanted every list and they'd sort it all out later. I confess that both scenarios seem a little farfetched. But some version of one of them basically had to happen, unless there's a prankster actually inside the campaign.

Whatever the case, I would just like everyone to remember this the next time you hear Trump caterwauling about Clinton selling out to foreign governments...